Game On
by Sueg5123
Summary: There was no question she would carry and keep the child.
1. Put the Jersey on the Desk

**The Jersey on the Desk**

She kept fooling herself until late April, when—with the absolute confirmation of medical science (by way of a pastel-colored box that blared fecundity)—she finally realized that _this was_ _happening_.

There was no question she would carry and keep the child. Although she could morally excuse the desperate women who made other choices, she knew her responsibility, quite apart from her seldom-practiced faith.

MacKenzie was all about responsibility. Recognizing it, assuming it, lugging it around as the cross of her choosing, even trying to impart it to others who might look to her as a role model.

So, despite feeling, for only the second time in her life, as though she might prove unworthy in this endeavor, she determined to meet motherhood head-on. Come what may.

By May, Mac had to notify Charlie, if for no reason other than the fact that he (not being a stupid man) was going to figure it out anyway. He took the revelation with gravity.

"Is this something you wanted?"

"I don't know." She tried to laugh. "It wasn't planned, if that's what you mean." Then, her resoluteness clamped down. "But—yes. I know what I have to do."

Understanding that by not directly answering his question she had in fact answered it, Charlie steepled his fingers and thought for a moment. "And the father, does he—"

"He won't be a part of this."

"Does he know?"

For the first time in this conversation, she hesitated. "Not yet. I've been putting it off. But I know I have to tell him."

Charlie leaned forward on his desk. "Do I know the father?"

There it was, virtually point blank. _Was it Will McAvoy_?

MacKenzie rose. "I wanted you to know, Charlie, because I'll probably need some consideration in the future. Time off, that kind of thing."

"Sure, kid. Whatever you need, whenever you need it." He noticed the non-answer but decided not to pursue it further. "The Atlantis HR people can give you the specifics on maternity leaves and all that, but apart from that, whatever you want, ACN will accommodate. You aren't by yourself. And personally— if you need anything, anything at all, Nancy and I—"

She forced a tremulous smile, suddenly afraid she might burst into tears at the generosity of her employer and friend.

"Thanks, Charlie. I ought to get back now, there's still the final run-down."

"Sure. And Mac, don't hesitate to let Harper and Keefer carry more of the load down there. They're extremely capable and you might need the help."

She made a tight nod as she eased from the office.

oooo

Telling Will should have been MacKenzie's next step, but she was unable to bring herself to do it. She didn't want to make herself vulnerable to his superior smirk and inevitable judgment. Another bad decision. Another set of consequences.

_You know this won't change anything between us._

She preferred to handle things on her own, so she held her peace for another month, until the middle of June, when circumstances, in the form of an eavesdropped conversation, intervened.

During the commercial break between B and C blocks, Will dislodged his IFB and pushed back in his chair for a brief respite from disembodied commands from Control.

Around him in the dark, the floor director yelled instructions to the grips, who positioned their ladder and began to make adjustments to the set.

"It's the key light—VTC says it's throwing off the picture bias."

The bushy-haired young man on the ladder reached for a light.

"Not that one," the floor director corrected. "The one next to it. EP says it's strobing."

"_EP says it's strobing_," the grip on the ladder repeated sarcastically to his co-worker on the floor. "Light looks fine to me. She's probably seeing things because of her _delicate condition_. I heard she got herself knocked up."

Will blinked.

The second grip nodded agreement. "I heard that, too. Yesterday, they were asking me to find a swivel shop stool for her to use in Control. Not something we get much call for around here, you know?"

"Will." The floor director turned his attention to the anchor. "Herb says to tell you we're thirty seconds back. Will? You hear me? Thirty back."

Will made as if to say something but held it and, instead, re-fitted the interruptible feedback unit into his ear. The commercial break audio bedlam of Control came through instantly, voices in low but urgent tones, a phone throbbing insistently in the background, Herb's own _basso profundo_ relentlessly ticking off the count back to live air.

There was the familiar _click-click_ of Mac toggling her mic. "Will, when we come back, we're going to open with the seizure of Anthony Weiner's laptop instead of Secretary Clinton's visit to Paris—there have been some developments."

_Yeah. Developments_, was what Will thought in response.

oooo

By late June, Mac was beginning to show and she had to abandon her pencil skirts for slacks with elastic panels and blouses worn outside them. She still procrastinated about updating Will on her status, but she had gradually revealed it to most of her other co-workers, who gratified her by celebrating the news without asking privacy-penetrating questions.

Kendra and Sloan even planned a baby shower on her behalf, although Sloan's contribution seemed to be relegated mainly to enthusiasm and stock picks for the eventual 529. Martin's evident dismay at not being initially included on the shower's invite-list resulted in the eventual inclusion of all _Y-chromosomers_ who wished to participation.

So, it pretty much became a free-for-all.

Except for Will, who still hadn't been officially told anything and who was regarded by most of the folks in the newsroom as too exalted to invite to a casual office shower.

Regarded as too exalted, that is, by everyone but Sloan, who, having exhausted her usefulness as a shower planner, resorted to rounding up the strays who hadn't committed cash or gifts yet.

When she walked into Will's office, unannounced (as usual) by any knock, she found an attractive bearded stranger sitting opposite the anchor.

"I know maybe a dozen reporters, guys you know, too, who tell me they've been pitching you this story for almost a year with no luck."

"Yeah, I'm not crazy about being interviewed in print. Print journalists play it fast and loose with exclamation points. I love the news becomes _I LOVE THE NEWS_, in boldface italics. Suddenly, I'm deranged." Will waved Sloan in. "This is Sloan Sabbith—"

"I know who she is," the stranger sniffed.

"—She's our dangerously over-credentialed economics personality."

Sloan frowned at the last word of his characterization.

"Sloan, this is Brian Brenner. He's here to do a piece about _News Night_, so you'll see him around the newsroom."

"Glad to meet you," Sloan said, returning Brenner's limp hand squeeze. "I've been reading you for years and didn't know what you looked like. Nice to finally put a face with the name." Then, the break for courteous introductions over, she turned her attention back to Will. "The office is doing a little thing for Mac next week and I didn't know if you had planned on—"

"We'll talk about it later, Sloan. Right now, I'm committed to Brian here."

"Oh. Well, I'll get with you later. Don't forget."

"I won't."

oooo

At first, MacKenzie seemed to take the news stoically.

"What about our history?" was her only question when Will informed her that Brenner would be hanging around the newsroom for the next week.

Will shrugged and lit a cigarette. "I told him he could make one parenthetical explanation in the second graph. Something along the lines of, he's been a friend of yours since, uh, the late '90s, wasn't it? Anyway, that's it." He crossed his ankles over the edge of his desk. "You're fine."

"I'm fine," she repeated, dully, dropping into a chair opposite Will's desk.

Before she could catch herself, her eyes began to film over with emotion and she struggled to swallow her feelings. The professional frustration of being forced to cover a possibly-murderous cocktail waitress. The very real physical frustration of being sick most mornings and exhausted the rest of the time. And, now, learning that Will, in some unspeakable burst of passive-aggressiveness, had brought Brian Brenner into their place of work.

There were thousands of print journalists in the big city and he had hired Brenner. It was calculated, it was deliberate, it was hurtful in the exquisite way that only old lovers knew to inflict. She just couldn't figure out what she had done to provoke Will's ire so that he would torment her in this way.

Watching her reaction, Will realized how he'd screwed this up. He'd thought of it as a little taunt, barbed but without permanent harm. Just a small jab at Mac for failing to—_failing to_—

"Brian needs to be seen as a heavyweight again, Mac. He's not gonna write a tell-all." He stubbed out the smoke, suddenly needing to devote his full attention to mitigating the damage of his little riposte. "It will only be a few days, I swear. You don't even have to participate if you don't want to."

"Well, after all, I can't think of anything I'd rather do than be interviewed by my ex-boyfriend. Except maybe eat my desk," she added, with more sadness than irony.

Willing herself back to some semblance of normalcy, she exhaled and looked up to meet Will's concerned and somewhat guilty eyes. "Well. I'm sure there's a genuine crisis somewhere on this floor right now that I'm needed to resolve. I think I'll go find it."

"Mac." His tone was plaintive but he just couldn't find the words. "I wish—"

"That's all right, Will. Nothing's changed between us, remember?"

oooo

In preparation for her segment, Sloan Sabbith joined Will at the News Night desk during commercial break.

"Hey, bro," her customary greeting as she tried to find the console port for her microphone jack.

Will checked the clock, then deftly leaned over and unplugged her mic-pac.

"Hey! I just put that—"

"Whatever little party you're throwing around here, keep me out of it. I don't want to be invited, I don't want to see crepe paper or balloons or plush animals, and I don't want any leftover sheet cake in _my_ conference room. Is that clear?"

Taken aback by his vehemence, she gulped and nodded.

Will slid a slip of paper across the desk. "Call Luis at this number. He'll fix you up with everything you—"

"Luis—as in, the Executive Dining Room's Luis?"

"Like I say, I want nothing to do with this. But make sure you give a courtesy ask to Leona—she probably won't attend, but you should always render unto Caesar and all that sort of thing—"

"Is Mrs. Lansing paying for this?"

"It's being taken care of. And one more thing. Talk to whoever orders stuff around here—"

"Stuff?"

"Office supplies—office furniture. _Stuff_. Have 'em get a chair for Mac in Control."

"A chair?"

"Is there a fucking echo here, Sloan? Yeah, a chair. Something high so she can see the monitors. Maybe on wheels. I don't know—ask her what kind would suit her." His eyes flicked to the clock behind Camera 3, then back. "Get your earpiece in, Sloan. Five seconds back."

oooo

Mac was diligent in avoiding Brenner for the next two days, but he finally stalked her into Control and waited until Kendra and Jake left them alone together.

"You've finally burned all your bridges now, huh?"

"I don't know what you mean, Brian." Impatiently. "And, do we have to do this now? I've got things to do."

He grabbed the secretarial chair a few stations over and dragged it nearer.

"C'mon, Mac." He grinned and nodded at her midsection. "Looks as though you're carrying more than just _News Night_. How did _this_ happen?"

"The usual way," she returned, coolly.

"Who's Papa Bear?" He leaned forward with a leer. "Don't tell me you and McAvoy are playing house? He certainly never gave me a clue when I talked with him earlier. Or is there someone new in your life—perhaps some studly young feller in your newsroom? Or are you going it alone, like some feminist throw-back?"

"Stop it, Brian. I don't owe you any excuses or information about my private life."

"No? Well, I guess the actual facts would make my speculation less—shall we say—entertaining." He shrugged theatrically. "It seems like a bad week to be here."

"You think?"

"I came here to write a story about how Will and _News Night_ changed overnight. Except maybe he hasn't changed at all." He glanced at the clipboard she had in her lap. "Balancing your show between the Casey Anthony circus and Anthony Weiner sexting, I see. Looks like the old Will McAvoy to me."

"We're having to make a few small compromises, but they're just temporary. We need to woo the viewers back to land the debates."

"And your concern is that if your ratings are low, you'll lose leverage?"

She nodded.

"You know, another way of looking at it is that he's using getting the debates as an excuse to dumb the show down. Once again."

"If you think that, you'd be wrong."

"Really? Well, for three years, McAvoy's show went out of the way to avoid reporting actual news. Then, you came back and turned him into some kind of crusading politico."

"Don't say that," she returned, hotly. "You don't know what you're talking about. Will has always been a crusader. He _feels_ things."

"Will has always been Will. Stodgy, unimaginative, and ungrateful for the talent of his staff." Brian crossed his arms across his chest. "He was never worthy of you, Mac. Professionally or otherwise."

"I just want to remind you that you are here to write a story about him. If you're harboring this sort of prejudice—"

"Perhaps I should decline the gig? Is that what you mean?"

"Exactly."

"Well, I'm afraid I don't normally work in the rarified atmosphere of Atlantis Cable News, so I can't always afford to turn down paying work. But—" he paused dramatically, "I'm on expenses for this job, so how 'bout I buy you lunch somewhere? We'll call it an interview and you can give me all the deep background on the show. As well as any other background that comes up." He made an expression that plainly conveyed his intent to return to his earlier guesswork about her condition and its source. "You look as though you could use a break, Mac. Also, it might do you good to talk to a friend."

She thought for a moment before reaching for the phone. "A break is probably a good idea, so yes to lunch. But as far as talking to a friend—I'd have to bring one with in order to do that." She smiled with blatantly phony sincerity, then spoke into the phone. "You free? Fifteen minutes, in the lobby."

She turned her attention back to Brenner. "You don't object to my bringing a chaperone, do you? Sloan Sabbith is our—"

He waved a hand in submission. "Met her earlier. What the hell."

oooo

Across the bullpen, Will noticed MacKenzie exit Control, closely followed by Brenner.

Will had anticipated, of course, that there would be some meeting between the two, ostensibly the inevitable interview process. What he hadn't counted on, however, was that the two would walk together to the elevator landing and enter the lift.

Obviously, nothing had changed between _them_, either.


	2. Happy Valentine's Day

**Chapter 2**

**Happy Valentine's Day**

**Valentine's Night, 2011**

MacKenzie dropped her reading glasses to the desk and rubbed the bridge of her nose. She wasn't aware of him standing in the doorway until she flicked off the desk lamp and the light from the bullpen highlighted his silhouette.

"Will. I thought you had gone by now," she said. "No big plans for the rest of the evening?"

Will shook his head simply. "You?"

"I gave my plans the heave-ho earlier today."

"Wade. On the terrace. I heard about that."

For something to do, she began to square the edges of a stack of papers. "I'm sure everyone has by now," wryly, with the best grace she could summon.

"How about a drink?"

"You and me?" She stopped her busy work and canted her head. "Seriously? Tonight, of all nights?"

"If the tongues of office gossips were ever gonna wag—well, we accomplished that a few hours ago, didn't we?" He shrugged. "It would be a shame for all that—_good will_—between us earlier to just go _poof_. Neither of us have any other—" he hesitated before finally, authoritatively, adding, "plans. Anyway, you can always say no. How about it?"

She considered it for a long moment, but finally found another objection. "Midtown on Valentine's night? Won't thing be crowded?"

"Then how about my place?"

She weighed the offer.

Will hadn't made things easy for her for the last ten months, but tonight there had been a crack, a break-through. His generous act of paying the ransom for Kahlid had inspired the office—exactly what she had hoped would happen when she once scolded him to become the integrity of the show and the moral center of the newsroom.

Was it possible that tonight had also led him to reappraise the two of them? That perhaps he was sympathetic to what she'd suffered under Wade's perfidy?

_N__obody in his right mind would risk losing you_.

That perhaps Will's generosity might even extend to—_forgiveness_?

It was a chance worth taking.

"Okay."

oooo 

Will's apartment, the new one he'd taken since they broke up, was all shiny glass and chrome, with monochromatic furniture and a lot of right angles and hard-defined edges. It looked minimalistic and severe, lacking warmth, and Mac was taken aback at trying to connect Will to this place that most resembled a high-rise penitentiary.

She slipped off her coat, still staring around the room.

Will, having proceeded upon entry to the kitchen, called out. "What'll you have? Scotch or Jameson's? There's red wine, too, if you'd rather have that."

"Whatever you're having will be fine."

When he returned with two scotches, he found her gazing out the terrace windows.

"Here's your drink."

"Thanks. Nice view."

"Yeah. The lights sparkle on clear nights. I sit out there a lot when the weather is more hospitable."

Nodding, she took a sip and turned back to the room. "I'm sure this was very well-intentioned, Will—but it seems like—well, like a peculiar holiday for the two of us to celebrate. _Together,_ I mean." She made a sad smile. "After all, the paper heart taped to your office door was publicly ripped in half, so you haven't exactly hidden your antipathy for the sentiment of the day."

He tried to look appropriately guilty at her indictment.

"In any event, I would have imagined you would be sharing a pheasant and chardonnay with some comely young brain surgeon or rocket scientist tonight." She hesitated before adding, drolly, "Perhaps even a gossip columnist."

"Wouldn't be the first time you'd been wrong."

"Granted." She took a seat on the white leather couch.

He swung into the chair opposite. "We had such a good evening tonight, Mac. Show went well. We saved what's-his-name—"

"His name is Kahlid, and you're the one who—"

Will made a dismissive gesture. "He's out, so where's the problem?"

"There _is_ no problem, not with him. That ended well, thanks to you." Setting her glass on the table between them, she made several attempts to put her thoughts into words. Finally, she swallowed and just said it. "The problem, I guess, is that I'm confused. About us. For a tiny moment tonight it was like it used to be and I don't know what that means—if it was just a comradely thing because of Kahlid's situation, or if—"

"Don't read too much into this, Mac. It's just a drink. We've had drinks together since you've been back."

"But this isn't Hang Chew's and there aren't twelve other staffers sitting two tables behind us."

"_Mac_. I said, don't make anything out of this." He cut her off by rising and pacing back to the terrace windows. "You know, I haven't told you, and I really should, but I am glad you returned. Relieved that you got back unscathed from that stupid little stunt of running off to a shooting war—"

She straightened at the implicit condescension of his words.

"—And glad you came back to the show. You've helped restore purpose and credibility—"

_To the show. Not, _to me.

"—I wasn't so happy when Charlie first told me, I made that pretty plain, to him and to you and to, well, just about everyone. I freely admit I may not be happy next week, but we did good things together tonight. I feel as though we've turned a corner."

Confusion filled her head now. She didn't know whether to take justified issue with his arrogant dismissal of three years in a war zone, or simply to be grateful for the professional validation that followed.

And was there possibly a hint of a change of heart, personally, as well?

She reached for her drink, hoping that the tremble in her hand wasn't visible from where he stood.

"Mac, I—" he started, then stopped, then resumed, haltingly. "You know, I did miss you while you were gone. I missed being with you. It's the highest compliment, you know. Acknowledging absence—missing your voice, feeling your disappointment when I've fallen short of the mark, anticipating the words you might have said…" He allowed his words to trail off. "So, it's been good to have you back, even if I haven't said it before now."

Her heart leapt. He was saying words of understanding. Not forgiveness, not exactly—but it was _promising_.

The next part seemed trickier, because his words became even more stilted and punctuated with long exhalations. "It felt—really good—to hold you tonight."

"It meant a lot to me as well."

"Yeah." Another long pause. "I don't know what to do, Mac. I can't un-know what you told me about you and Brian. I can't go back in time. I don't know if things could be different a second time."

At this point, any response on her part would have looked like salesmanship, so Mac said nothing and waited.

"Could things be different?" His question seemed genuine.

"I'd like to think they would be."

"Last year, when I was on that panel at Northwestern University—you know, I thought I saw you in the audience. It really flustered me. That's when I went, I dunno, crazy. Yelled at that kid and everything."

"So, you're blaming that on me?"

"I'm just saying, you have an effect on me." He turned and offered a laconic smile. "You ready for another drink?"

She made short laugh. "Are you trying to get me drunk?"

"The thought had occurred to me."

She stared. "I can't tell if you are joking, Will."

"Of course, I'm joking. Can't we just enjoy ourselves tonight, Mac? Off the office leash?"

Fully aware of the subtext she was offering, she stuck out her empty glass.

oooo

An hour later, he rested the guitar he had been balancing over his knee and bowed his head.

An audience of one, she nonetheless clapped enthusiastically. "I've always loved to hear you play." She checked her watch and rose. "I should go. It's after midnight and tomorrow is a working day."

He came over to where she stood, so near she could feel the heat of his body, demanding her to notice him. "Stay, Mac." He brought his hand up to lightly grip her upper arm.

"Will," she laughed, nervously, shifting from his grasp. "Tempting, but you know that this probably isn't what you're going to want come the morning."

"You should stay."

His simple insistence so surprised her that it took her a moment to find her voice. She thought to deflect and thereby defuse what was rapidly becoming an awkward moment.

"Let me tell you something, Billy. If I ever find out you've paid a gossip columnist money to protect me, I will beat you senseless. And you know I can do it."

"I know. But I didn't."

"You didn't? Gary told me what Nina threatened—and then you disappeared for an hour this afternoon—so I assumed that while you were out ransoming Kahlid, you ransomed the other hostage, as well. _Me_."

"I didn't. But I would have if it had been necessary."

His hand came up again, sliding lightly along her jawline before dropping to her collarbone and then to her shoulders. He brought her against him, arms winding over hers. Another Rudy hug.

Her eyes widened, wondering what had prompted this, was she misreading him, what it meant for the two of them, and—most importantly—how she should react. There was a giddy pleasure in being held again by Will, to be sure, and there was even the exhilaration of wondering if this was the sign of forgiveness. Of course, she wanted to stay with him, but she knew, somewhere in the back of her mind, that a gentle hug by itself was not the sort of thing to mend all that had gone wrong between them. That would require more than just the _bonhomie_ of co-workers over after-hours drinks.

Overwhelmed suddenly by the sense memory of him being this near, his warmth and his scent, she fell into the embrace, wrapping her own arms around him. At first, his strong arms held her firmly in place, but, eventually, he slid one hand up to cradle the back of her head and keep it positioned against his shoulder.

"I need you tonight, Mac," he murmured. "I want you and I need you, and I know you need me, too."

There it was.

Her breaths were already shallow from the _frisson_ of contact, undermining any thought of denying him—her—both—

He broke the clinch and, wordlessly, took her hand, leading her across the room and through the short hallway to his dark bedroom. She frowned when he drew back, suddenly fearing the implication of the broken contact, but his eyes never left hers, challenging her to follow.

Dropping her hand, he raised his and gently ran his thumb across her bottom lip. Whatever he was thinking, whatever he was on the verge of saying, it never actually made it to his voice-box but seemed to stop at his lips, becoming a slow, knowing smile.

This was the Will she remembered, gentle and attentive.

oooo

He was gentle and attentive in the morning as well.

She woke first and dressed. When she finally looked up, she saw Will's eyes were open and that he was silently watching her.

"I need to go home. Shower and change for work."

He made no counterargument, just continued to watch without comment until she reached for her coat. Then, he swung out of bed, reached for his clothes and finally spoke.

"Let me take you downstairs and get a cab for you."

He called ahead to the doorman, so that a taxi was visible at the curb by the time they reached the lobby of the building. Coatless and in loafers, he escorted her out to the car through the gray slush of two-days-previous snowfall and embraced her lightly before opening the car door.

"We're good, Mac. I'll see you at work in a little while."

As the cab pulled into traffic, she at last had a moment to reflect on Will's behavior and his words.

_This won't change anything between us._

When he'd said that the night before, she took it as a lover's reassurance that their present connection transcended their estrangement. That there might be a barrier between the professional and the personal, but it was protective, so that no work-related tension would seep into their relationship.

Now, this morning, she realized it was simply a nod toward maintaining the _status quo_—in effect, reducing their act of love to an evening's diversion.

His consideration as a lover proved exactly the same as she remembered, except that it was tempered by this morning's realization that his attentions had never included a simple kiss between them. A night of lovemaking on the signal day for romance had been totally lacking the most basic gesture of mutual affection.

She understood now.

_This won't change anything between us._

Obviously, it would not.


	3. Rudy Rudy

So much blood.

That was what she kept seeing whenever she closed her eyes. Blood drops forming a hideous trail to the bathroom, blood splattered on the floor and toilet, the crimson spots that matted the roll of tissue.

"_They're on the way. Just a few minutes." Manny had reappeared in the doorway and simply hovered, wanting to appear comforting even as he probably felt nervous and awkward. "What can I do?"_

_Mac knelt on the cold tile floor beside Will, still unconscious, and used a wet washcloth to gently wipe at the smears of blood around his mouth. Given the physical realities of her now-early third trimester body, it was a not-inconsiderable exertion, and her back and shoulders ached as she hunched over him._

"_Call downstairs—make sure they know how to find us—we don't want to lose any time—"_

_Will had remained unconscious for most of the ambulance ride, except for one moment when his eyes fluttered open and met hers, then rapidly turned away._

She felt a nudge against her shoulder and looked up. It was Charlie.

"They have him in a room now, so we can go up."

"How is—what did the doctor say?" Exhaustion and enervation had lulled her to sleep in the waiting room, and she'd missed the medical recap.

"The doctor said he'd passed all his exams with flying colors. Blood count, liver function test, and whatever else he said. There doesn't seem to be any further bleeding in the upper GI and his blood pressure is stable, so the treatment appears to be taking hold. If I know Will, he'll be up and terrorizing the hospital staff by mid-morning."

Charlie bent down to help her struggle out of the waiting room chair. Six months along and standing unassisted from deep seating had become a bit of a problem.

"You okay, kid?" He dipped his chin in concern and looked through shaggy brows at her. "You don't have to go if you don't want—"

"I'm okay, Charlie. I want to see him."

"Well, the doctor said he'd been mildly sedated for the EGD, whatever that is, and that he might still be kind of groggy when we see him. Also, that an overzealous EMT had tried to intubate him in the ambulance and—"

"I was there. I remember."

"Well, anyway, the upshot is that his throat is going to be pretty raw, so even if he does wake up, he's not going to be in a talking mood. That, plus he's still bound to have a hell of a headache from whatever he drank, not to mention the fall—"

She stopped. "Are you trying to prepare me for something, Charlie?"

"Sweet Jesus, I don't know what you two are to each other anymore, Mac—so, maybe yes, maybe I _am_ trying to prepare you. But for nothing more than what I just said, what the doctor just told me, which is that he's going to be groggy and hurting."

She nodded and walked on. When she noticed that Charlie hadn't immediately followed, she turned. "Charlie?"

"You know, Mac—it's pretty normal to see people who are in love walking arm in arm or at least side by side. It's pretty abnormal to see lovers who walk all alone by choice."

"Your point?"

"My point is that whatever the fuck is between you and Will is screwing up both your lives. You're both—well, _resolutely_ lonely, I guess I'd call it, and you seem to be living that way out of spite for the other."

"_Spite_, Charlie? I was the one who—who—" She couldn't say it. It brought back the blood again. "And last night I careened through Manhattan in an ambulance—" She dropped her voice as a hospital employee passed down the corridor. "Spite? I don't see anything spiteful in what I've done for him over the last 24 hours."

"You're behaving like he owes you something," Charlie responded in a patently know-it-all tone.

"Owes me?" she repeated, a bid for time to compose a response. Denial seemed the best ticket.

"Not at all. Will doesn't _owe_—I mean, there's nothing between us. Just air. We're colleagues, we have a professional relationship, that's all, and we're satisfied with that. _Owes me_," she repeated again, to impart a delicate flavor of incredulity that she hoped added to the believability.

With a small smile, Charlie shook his head. "Well, methinks thou doth protest too much, MacKenzie. But have it your way. Shall we?"

Taking her elbow, he steered her down the hallway and around the corner, where a heavy man looked uncomfortable in a small chair.

"You must be Smitty," he greeted the man, "no, don't get up. I'm Charlie Skinner of ACN and this is Ms. McHale." Charlie turned to Mac and added, "Lonny Church's relief man. He'll be here for the rest of the morning."

She offered a perfunctory smile as the introduction. Reassuring to know that someone was still on watch for the unconscious or doped-up Will.

In the room, a scrub-clad attendant busied herself with the infusion pump stand and an array of telemetric monitors. She looked up briefly at the interruption of new visitors, then quickly returned to signal tracing her wire leads.

Will's eyes were open. Lighting on Charlie, he made a shrug of self-deprecation.

"How're you feeling?" Charlie asked, knowing the question was inane, given the circumstances, but the only one that fit the moment.

Will made another shrug and twisted one side of his mouth into a wry smile.

Mac inched nearer to the bed rail, trying to gauge for herself Will's true status. At her approach, he suddenly averted his eyes. This time she thought she detected a touch of shame in his expression.

"Well," Charlie boomed in bogus bonhomie. "You're going to need to watch those little drinking sprees now that you're creeping upward in age. They can take a toll on a man. You probably should take the rest of the day off and rest up." His eyes twinkled, belying the deliberate understatement.

Will's annoyance was plain.

"We'll bring Jane up from D.C., so _News Night_'ll be in good hands."

At this, Will rolled his eyes.

Now openly smirking, Charlie touched Mac's arm. "Since Murrow here is doing so much better than I thought, I'm going to go have another cup of that delicious waiting room coffee. Come down and find me when you're finished here and I'll give you a lift home."

With that, Charlie exited, shortly followed by the medical attendant. Alone with him for the first time, MacKenzie gripped the rail and looked anxious.

Will tried to offer another shrug, this one bigger but constrained by the IV line on one hand.

"Why did you do this?"

With an expression of mixed astonishment and indignation, he opened his mouth to respond but winced at the effort. Regrouping, he gestured to the pad and pen on the nightstand and she retrieved them for him.

Undeterred, she went on while he wrote.

"What is _wrong_ with you? It's been two weeks since the article—you've been so morose, so obviously depressed—and now, _this_—"

Defiant, he held up his pad. _Accident. __Not__ deliberate. __Not__ sad._

"Anti-depressants, Will," she countered. "I heard Lonny tell the doctor 135 milligrams a day of Effexor. Plus, the alcohol. You let that—that _hatchet job_ magazine article do this to you. You got bad press. Not the first time. Not even the first time from my idiot ex-boyfriend."

Plainly wincing at her characterization of Brenner, he shook his head and began to scribble.

_Brian was Knight of Mirrors—to bring me down, total fool—_

Reading as he wrote, she snorted. "You're being delusional. Nobody's brought you down, least of all him. You've got to give up this _Don Quixote_ fantasy—"

Eyes widened in exasperation, he pointed a finger at his chest, as if to say, _Me_?

"—And get back in your chair, because that red light will go on and you will—"

He held up the pad again.

_Why did you come last night?_

MacKenzie let her mouth open and close without sound coming out. Finally, she managed, "You have to stop letting it get to you, Will. The article. Brian. Whatever intrigues Leona is hatching on the 44th floor. You have to focus on—"

He pointed to the words he'd written. _Why did you come last night?_

"I—" she faltered and looked down. "You've been so down—everybody's noticed—I thought someone should check on you, make sure that—"

_Why?_

"I don't—someone needed to, and it just seemed that I was the only one who—"

He'd written another phrase. _What changed?_

"Nothing—nothing's changed." Even though her voice faltered a bit, she made sure to meet his eyes.

He stared at her for a long moment, visibly unsure, before swallowing and dropping the notepad. Shaking his head slightly, he gestured at her baby bump, then closed his eyes, exhausted by her evasions.

She felt dismissed.

"Get some sleep, Will. I'll be by later."

When he made no reaction, she eased out the door into the corridor.

He'd asked _why_ she'd been the one to find him. The question took her by surprise. In having come to his apartment to check on his well-being, she had tipped her hand. Revealed that her concern had been personal, not professional.

Even voiceless, he had still managed to reproach her, his first and only acknowledgement of her situation. He had seemed to make clear his disdain—that this was just another example of her recklessness. That nothing had or ever would change.

Suddenly, she felt lightheaded and put out an arm to brace herself. The Blue North operative outside Will's door jumped up to assist, steadying her and steering her toward the chair he'd formerly occupied.

"You okay? Can I call someone?"

"I'm fine." She waved off the seat and just clung to his arm. "Just lost my balance there for an instant, but I'm okay now. Thank you."

Smitty frowned. "Are you sure? You seem kinda pale, and—"

"Really, I'm fine." She tried to smile warmly, dropping his arm. "Thank you again, but I really need to find Charlie Skinner."

He watched as she continued down the linoleum-tiled passageway.

oooo

Two days later, Charlie and MacKenzie were back in Will's hospital room. The patient seemed in better spirits and able to make hoarse replies to their attempts at conversation.

Finally, with a warning glance at Mac, Charlie cleared his throat.

"Mac tells me that Nina Howard claims to have a source that knows you were high during the bin Laden broadcast."

"Bluffing," Will croaked.

"No. She called this morning, wanted me to meet her outside Central Park. She's waiting for a second source."

Will looked from Charlie to Mac and back to Charlie, dropping his voice. "I didn't know that _you_ knew I was high during the bin Laden broadcast."

"For what it's worth, I _didn't_, but that's a conversation for another day. If TMI goes to press with this, Leona will use it as grounds to fire you."

"Who's her source?"

"Doesn't matter."

"Well, the good news is," Will said, reaching for a glass of water, "I'm already disgraced, so I'm impervious to public shaming. I'm disgrace-proof."

"You've got a non-compete clause in your contract—" both Mac and Will averted their eyes as Charlie reminded him, "so your anchoring days are over if this gets out. Leona will insist."

"So why haven't they published? Does Nina want money to make it go away? I mean, it isn't as though she has journalistic scruples enough to wait for a second source confirmation." It was the longest string of words Will had uttered since they had returned. His voice was sounding a bit stronger.

"She didn't hint at money," Mac replied, trying to recapture an impression of Nina Howard's demeanor. "She seemed urgent, like it was time sensitive, but I took her more as a warning than a direct threat. I can't be certain but I think she was trying to trick me into confirming it for her."

Actually, Nina Howard had seemed equally malevolent on two fronts: the accusation about Will having been high on air, as well as a strong insinuation that either Wade or Will must be the father of MacKenzie's baby. Mac had rejected Nina's speculation on the latter as scornfully as she dared, not wanting to provoke additional scrutiny from the gossip queen. Let Nina occupy herself with bigger and more lucrative scandals, such as housewives of New Jersey or Nova Scotia or wherever.

Meanwhile, clustered around Will's hospital bed, Charlie and Will went silent, trying to assign motive to Nina Howard and figure out her next step.

"Mac." Will shifted uncomfortably. "The voicemail message that I left for you that night after I got home from the bin Laden broadcast—did you play it for anyone?"

"Message? I never got a message."

"Yes. Sure you did. It started, 'hey, listen, it's me, and I'm not just saying this because I'm high right now.'" He paused, dramatically, waiting for her to recall it. "Did anyone else hear that message?"

"I didn't get a message from you."

"Mac, there is no way that you don't remember what that message said—"

She made an exasperated huff. "It isn't that I've misremembering the content, Will—_I never got that message_. It wouldn't have been possible for me to play it for someone else because I never got it."

Charlie tumbled to the truth first. "That's why Nina has to wait for the second source—she can't reveal how she got the first—"

"There was _no_ message so I'm not following this—"

"Mac, someone at TMI hacked your phone and deleted it." Charlie turned to face Will, seeing his own conclusion mirrored in Will's face. "Nina's first source was you."

"What else did the message say?" Mac insisted, suddenly feeling that she was missing the most vital part of the whole conversation. "You had already told me about being high—what did you call me that night to say?"

Will flipped back the covers on his bed. "I need to get back to work."

"You're still sick."

"What is illness to the body of our knight errant—Sancho, my armor, my sword—"

Charlie and Mac exchanged helpless looks.

"Which one of us is he talking to?"

Nurse Cooper entered, scowling. "I've got alarms going off at the nurse's station. What's going on here? Who pulled out the IV line?"

"She did," Will made an exaggerated motion to indicate MacKenzie. He took two more paces then stopped short, weaving a little. "Okay, I'm getting a little dizzy now."

"Get back in bed!"


	4. Closer and Closer

**Closer and Closer**

_"Uh oh. Death ray," Charlie observed, catching Will squint. "Let's move over here."_

_Taking his drink, he moved to a table away from the floor-to-ceiling windows of the AWM executive dining room. Will followed a moment later, and a waiter hurried over to see what was the problem._

_"Everything's fine, but you gotta __warn__ people about that reflection off the HBO building across the street," Charlie said as the waiter, murmuring apologies, swooped in with a new table set-up and glasses of ice water. "The infrared was broiling us alive, not to mention extracting all the antioxidents from my bourbon."_

_Will made a faint smile of amusement and lifted his glass of water. "Still on the wagon."_

_"That stuff will make you a free radical magnet, Will. Anyway—where were we?"_

_"You wanted __News Night__ to poke a stick in the GOP's eye."_

_"All I'm saying is, why not take a stand for god's sake? Quit pitting red against blue talking heads in gladiatorial combat every night and just take a stand for the American people."_

_"Why would I want to rock that boat? I've got the second highest-rated newscast on cable."_

_"I don't give a shit."_

_"I know that, Charlie. That's why I have to." Will cast a furtive glance around to the other diners and dropped his voice to the level of discretion. "Think of it as __me__ looking out for __your__ interests with Reese Lansing and the 44__th__ floor."_

_"Don't you worry about Reese Lansing. I have a secret weapon to bend him to my will."_

_"The hacking thing?" Will shrugged. "Well, I was in that meeting too, and Reese didn't look too bent."_

_Charlie used a finger to stir the ice through his bourbon. "You ever think about kids?"_

_Will pulled back at the non sequitur. "Adopting? Abducting? I don't know what you're talking about here."_

_"Relationship. Getting married. The usual thing."_

_"Oh. The __usual__ thing," Will snorted. "Well, first of all, I'm on the threshold of fifty and so I'm now closer to the end than to beginning—"_

_Charlie snorted. "AWM has you insured for $15 million so I think they think you're worth the risk. Anyway, you don't look to me like you're going to die soon—"_

_"—And, besides, there's this problem of finding the right brood mare, so to speak." Will stopped under Charlie's supercilious gaze. "No, no, no, no. This isn't going to turn into another lecture about forgiveness, is it?"_

_"The two of you could really help each other, you know, especially now." _

_"Mac is—I don't know what's in her head. I don't know what she's trying to prove right now." Will wormed back in his seat, sighing with exasperation. "Come on, Charlie. Not every story has a happy ending."_

_"Well, sometimes happiness is just a choice you have to make."_

_"And if you're implying that Mac needs me to—look, obviously, she gets along fine on her own. She's an adult, she's survived three years in a goddam war zone on her own, so I don't think she needs me."_

_"Actually, I was thinking that you needed her." With that, Charlie signaled to the waiter for another drink._

_oooo_

"Am I going to lose the baby?"

After she'd recovered enough to ask a question, that was the only one that seemed to matter. Her voice betrayed her anxiety.

"I need you to stay calm, MacKenzie. I know we spoke about gestational hypertension last time. As I told you then, it isn't an uncommon development, particularly given your age and that this is your first pregnancy. But your blood pressure readings and now the results of the kidney-function and blood-clotting tests—" The doctor allowed his words to trail off and sighed. "I'm pretty sure we're looking at PE now. Preeclampsia."

"I've read about it, I think."

"We probably had a generic discussion about that, early on, but there have been a lot of tests and a lot of conversations, so don't fault yourself if you don't remember it. Anyway, now that we know what we're dealing with—"

"_Will I lose the baby?"_

"Short answer, no. Not necessarily," he hedged after a second. "If the condition isn't treated, preeclampsia can lead to eclampsia, which is a much more serious complication and which could possibly—" he lifted his eyebrows to convey how hypothetical he considered the conjecture, "endanger _both_ of you."

He reached for the chart on the desk.

"You're still taking the calcium supplement? Good. Stay with that and add a low-dose aspirin daily. PE isn't always responsive to behavioral factors, but I think that in your case, perhaps you would benefit from prescriptive bed rest—"

"You mean, stop working and—" Mac was all for precautions, but this wasn't one she'd imagined. She had planned to work until two weeks before her due date.

"We should take every precaution, don't you think?"

"You're talking _literal_ bed rest—like, resting in bed? All day? Every day?"

He shrugged. "A lot of my patients find they can telecommute effectively and—"

"Telecommute? It sounds like house arrest to me."

"Nevertheless," the doctor smiled, indulgently, "for your own well-being and for that of this baby, you are going to have to make some changes—another of which is that we may have to consider a Caesarian. It would allow us to better control the outcome, but it is a surgical procedure and carries the attendant risks of surgery."

He leaned back in his chair and put the tips of his fingers together. "MacKenzie, I don't want to seem to pry into private matters, but perhaps you should ask yourself what this—_experience_—means to you. A baby isn't a goalpost, and you aren't going to be home free in just a couple of months. This event will change your life for the remainder of your life."

She closed her eyes, absorbing the import of his words.

"In the meantime, keep in mind what I mentioned about the bedrest, and I'll see you next week."

oooo

For nearly eight months she had treated her situation as something to be accommodated. Dietary concessions that excluded foods and drinks possibly harmful to a baby. The compromise of a new wardrobe, as she no longer fit the pencil skirts and the silk blouses and Louboutins. Even movement had become a daily negotiation, as her gait became a waddle and the simple act of standing required firm support. And, now, erasing the division between work and rest, so that rest subsumed work—definitely the inverse of her usual pattern.

_A baby isn't a goalpost_.

She was adventurous and intellectual and she had the Peabody awards to prove it. And now she was reduced to incubator for a child.

The trouble was, sometimes Mac herself didn't know how to regard this… event. There was some hype that suggested it should be the culminating experience of her life, as a woman. But it seemed daunting as a partner-less woman, and even more so as a career woman. How could she maintain any kind of professional schedule if she had to nurse and care for an infant?

So… was this goodbye to her career?

oooo

"The official NTC account is that he died from a gunshot wound to the head," Gary flipped a page on his legal pad, "but there's some cell phone video—I've seen it, it's kind of gruesome—that suggests Gaddafi might have been tortured to death by the militia. Meanwhile, there are competing purges taking place between the factions and 66 bodies of loyalists were just discovered at Mahari."

"B block and just the facts. We'll let CNN and Fox handle the gruesome."

"Roger that."

Orders given, Gary Cooper and the other newspups trudged out, leaving only Will and Mac in the conference room.

"Will," she said, stopping him as he rose. "If you have a moment?"

"Yeah?"

"I've, uh—I've cleared this with Charlie, but you should know—I'm going to be taking some time off. Jim will be here for _News Night_ throughout, and most of the time I'll only be a phone call away. Anyway, Don is close at hand, and—"

"How long are we talking about?"

She looked pained at having to respond to that one. "Six—perhaps up to ten weeks—"

"Ten weeks? Because—?"

"Because?" she echoed back, indignation and anger creeping into her voice.

Perhaps the consequence of having once confessed _too much_ was now to admit _too little_.

"Because my, um, my _circumstances_ have changed. I'm going to have a baby, Will—perhaps you've noticed something different about me lately?" She gestured to her swollen abdomen. "Actually, I had hoped that you would eventually say something—"

"What the hell am I supposed to say, Mac?" he repeated, with an unmistakably injured tone. "Frankly, I was waiting for _you_—especially since I figured there's a fifty percent chance that I might be—"

"One hundred."

That left him totally nonplussed. Following a long pause, he finally managed, "I thought that guy Wade—"

"Don't be daft. Wade wanted on the show, not in my bed." She dropped her head a bit. "He had—well, let's say he had creative rationale for a chaste relationship."

"I—I didn't know."

"Not something that would have come up in casual office conversation."

"Mac—I'm not sorry. I mean, that he wasn't—" His words trailed off as he realized the other half of the equation. Wade was a bounder, and obviously possessed dubious judgment if he passed up MacKenzie in any way—but if Wade wasn't in fatherhood contention, then—

"So, it's one hundred percent, Will. You can do a DNA test later if you want to confirm it, for whatever purpose. My life is upside down now. The doctor is putting me on bedrest for the remaining time."

He straightened. "Some problem?"

"—No problem, just the omnipotence of medicine. He can order it, _ergo_, he does."

"Oh." Will ran a hand through his hair, feeling that he hadn't been prepared for quite this much revelation at an ordinary rundown meeting. "But you're fine, right?"

"Betrayed by heredity and my blood pressure—but, other than that, perfect."

"You sound—just a little bit angry." He reconsidered the accusation. "I mean, I totally get that you've been doing this on your own and that—"

"You don't have to lecture me about recklessness and consequences."

"Not going to. But at the time, I thought that you—well, that you had taken the _precautions_, you know, and I—" He stopped, beginning to be aware of the inadequacy of his argument.

"Look Will, you were the one who said nothing would change between us. Nothing has, not really. I'm simply notifying a colleague of an adjustment to my professional status. I am not portraying myself as some tragic Tolstoy heroine."

"Well, I'm relieved to hear that, as there are entirely too many trains available in Manhattan." He waited a moment and made a feeble smile. "'S a joke, Mac." At her continued silence, he began again, in frustration. "We're in this together, aren't we? You just told me that I—you just confirmed that I'm the—"

She waited for him to decide his words, but after ten seconds, when no intelligible sounds emerged, she threw in the towel.

"I made a mistake. My mistake, our child. I should have told you something sooner, but I was concerned about the—_ramifications_—of doing so. Anyway, it's important that you know that I'm not trying to guilt you into anything."

He gnawed at his lip. "Look, that night last February—it wasn't offhand, it wasn't thoughtless—I mean, I didn't give it a lot of thought beforehand—"

_Or after, either. _

"—But I was honest with you. I told you that it wouldn't change things between us."

"Except that it has," she finished for him, then shook her head sadly. "Your honesty is noted and applauded. For what it's worth, I don't regret it." Then, _sotto voce_, "It certainly didn't change how I feel."

_How do you feel?_

That was the question in his mind. That was the question that had been uppermost in his mind since Valentine's Day—particularly, every day since May 1st, when he'd bared heart and soul in an ill-considered, weed-clouded phone call.

_How much was he willing to confess?_

The sorrow in her eyes made him risk another admission.

"I can't go back to hating you, Mac—well, _seeming_ to hate you. Because I don't—I've never—"

"Please _don't_—you don't have to say anything to make me feel better, Will. We're good for now. I just wanted you to know that I won't be in the office for a bit, that's all." She made a weak smile and began gathering her papers. "You're on in fifteen. You'd better get busy."

"Yeah."

But as he was almost out of the conference room, he suddenly pivoted and turned back.

"Er… do you know yet—I mean, has the doctor said what it—?"

"It's a girl, Will."

oooo

_A girl._

Not that it particularly mattered. Mac wasn't insisting on his participation in this event and he certainly hadn't promised anything. So, the gender of a child that hadn't even been born yet was very much an abstraction.

But—_a girl._

The knowledge alone made it real, gave him pause.

Valentine's night had had real consequences. It wasn't just two people brought together by loneliness—well, it may have started that way, but it certainly wasn't finishing that way.

He should have said something more to Mac.

Perhaps an apology. As he reflected, and contrary to what he'd implied earlier, he had been more of a seducer on Valentine's Day and not so much a lover, even the casual kind. He had exploited the good feeling between the two of them to his own ends. Not just the sex, but the _missing_ of MacKenzie, the phantom ache that had never healed.

Unlike what he had maintained until even a little while ago, Will had never hated Mac.

Quite the opposite.

_You have all my love. If you still want it._

He wasn't sure she did any longer.

He had known he still loved her at the office New Year's Eve celebration, when he loathed that she was with that opportunistic worm Wade.

Obviously, he still loved her in February, because that had been when collegiality and nostalgia coalesced into friendliness, however fateful and precarious.

And then there came March and April, with persistent pressure of pent-up feelings, swelling until they finally came spilling out in May in a voice mail that she denied ever receiving.

And because he had assumed her silence meant the worst, that her feelings had waned, he also convinced himself that he wasn't the one to blame for her… present situation.

But now, given the truth—and it was undoubtedly the truth, because MacKenzie was, if nothing else, always dangerously honest—what could he do to make things a bit easier for her?

oooo

"I like my clutter," Mac protested on the phone several days later.

"No one's taking it away from you," he batted back. "I just thought that maybe someone should be around to, I dunno, bring you groceries and do laundry. Make sure you have plenty of highlighters and the morning newspapers. Maybe even make you soup and a sandwich now and then."

"Seriously, Will, a housekeeper? It really isn't necessary. I appreciate the thought, but I can get by—"

"You're supposed to be resting—doctor's orders, remember? Staying off your feet and horizontal is pretty key to the rest part."

"Still, this seems overboard."

"Humor me, Mac. Deep pockets and all, you know?"

There was a protracted pause over the phone before she made the slightest huff of laughter. "Deep pockets. Okay."

"So. How're things going among the leisure class?"

"Well. I've discovered that daytime television is totally moronic, irrespective of five hundred cable channels from which to choose. Also, that ACN should move Jane Barrow to mornings, which would make a perfect marriage of insipid to tasteless.

With a laugh, Will moved back to his terrace, his drink in one hand and a plate with a sandwich in the other, the cell phone tucked under his jaw. "And you're feeling all right?"

"Slight headache all day, but otherwise as well as can be expected."

"Well, enjoy the time off and get back here before the November sweeps."

He wanted her back on the show. Some niggling part of her mind always believed that he would use any absence as opportunity to bilge her from the show.

She took a long time to come back after that curve ball.

"So, I'm coming back." She left just the tiniest lilt of uncertainty at the end of the sentence to distinguish it from a declarative statement. From foregone conclusion to—well, needing a bit of reassurance.

Which he provided. "Yeah. You're coming back."

_You have all my love. If you still want it._

oooo

One night later, Sloan interrupted Will as he was gathering his papers after the broadcast.

"Ride to the hospital, bro?"

"Hosp—?"

"Mac. Her doctor's inducing labor."

His eyes widened. "When did this happen?"

"I guess the doctor got a little worried with some of the symptoms she's been having. Vision problems, shortness of breath—"

"But I just talked to her last night. She said she had a headache—she didn't mention anything more."

"Maybe she was putting on a brave front, or maybe things just reached a tipping point today. Anyway, she's at the hospital now, and if you want—"

"Give me three minutes to get my street clothes on," Will growled, loosening his tie and flinging it onto someone's desk.

Thirty minutes later, Will sat in an uncomfortable plastic chair watching a late night TV personality on a soundless monitor. Sloan had gone immediately to MacKenzie's room, a precedence that he welcomed, for giving him a few minutes to consider what came next.

Mac had put her health, possibly her life, on the line to have this baby. _His_ baby.

He couldn't be indifferent now. He had to be supportive. He owed it to Mac—plus, he owed it to this new being.

Sloan was suddenly there beside him.

"This is a good moment. Why don't you go on back there?"

"Um, yeah." He still wasn't sure what he was supposed to do. Was he supposed to be fatherly or husbandly—neither of which he had ever been before, so neither role felt particularly familiar—or was he supposed to simply be a supportive colleague?

oooo

She looked small in the room, where several medical workers attended to their functions without consulting her. MacKenzie looked adrift but brightened at the sight of him.

"You didn't have to come," she murmured, belying her pleased look at seeing him there.

"Showing up seems like the least I could do." He looked sympathetic. "Are you comfortable?"

"As comfortable as can be, with a wide-eyed doctor and a Pitocin drip."

"Why's your doctor—"

She made a dismissive shrug. "He's the excitable sort. Doesn't like my blood pressure, doesn't like my symptoms, wants to get this baby out of me as soon as he can."

Will nodded. "Well, if the baby is determined to be born, it would seem that the least you could do is simply get out of the way."

"Doing my best."

Then, ignoring her open surprise, he pushed a lock of her hair back behind her ear.

"So—have you given any thought to names?"

"Some. I like the old-fashioned ones: Emma, Amelia. I liked Mia quite a lot but Mia McHale may be _too_ alliterative—"

"So sayeth _MacKenzie Morgan McHale_."

She made a commiserative half-laugh, conceding his point. "Well, there's Charlotte, a family name that I rather like."

He made a definitive nod, then let several beats pass.

"How about my name?"

There was an awkward silence while she considered the feminine equivalent of William. _Willemina_? No way she would ever saddle a kid with that moniker. Then another potential meaning dawned upon her.

"What are you saying, Will?"

"McAvoy. How about that? How about for the three of us?"


End file.
